Elliott Abrams is a senior fellow for Middle Eastern Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington DC. He was Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Adviser under Geoge W. Bush. Read more

David Abulafiais Professor of Mediterranean History at Cambridge and a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College. His latest book is The Great Sea: A Human History of the Mediterranean (Penguin), was awarded the new British Academy Medal.

Lincoln Allison retired from an academic career at the University of Warwick in 2004 — and again in 2008 — to become a freelance writer and broadcaster. He remains Emeritus Reader in Politics at the University of Warwick and Visiting Professor in sport and leisure at the University of Brighton. His latest book is My Father's Bookcase: A Version of the History of Ideas (Social Affairs Unit).

Hephzibah Anderson contributes regularly to the Observer and the Daily Mail in the UK, and writes a column on sex and the media for Adweek in the US. She is the author of a memoir, Chastened (Vintage).